472others as a perfect believer. He is only a babe, says the apostle, a partaker of milk; and a
babe can not be expected to assist as midwife or nurse in the spiritual birth of other babes.
It is the great mistake of many Sunday-schools to make sucking lambs do the work of
ewes; of neglecting to feed the new-born babes with spiritual knowledge and discipline. And
the insane notion, which is gaining ground more and more, that a young man who has
evinced but a slight stir of spiritual life must be promoted at once to the state of the mature
Christian, brings destruction upon the Church. This is why so few inquire after the truth,
or seek to enrich themselves with spiritual knowledge; why the spiritual life seems to consist
only of running and racing until, spiritually exhausted and impoverished, men sit down
bitterly disappointed. This makes unhealthy Christians, spiritually consumptive, tall and
thin, with glittering eye and hectic cheek, but without manly, strength and vigorous pulse.
Of course, such can not resist the whirlwind of strange teachings without being carried
about with every wind of doctrine.
Wherefore we repeat that a new-born babe must first be fed with milk; then be sent to
school, not to teach, but to learn. And the ministers of the Word in the pulpit, parents at
home, and teachers in our Christian schools should examine themselves whether they un-
derstand the art of feeding the babes with milk, whether in the teaching the bread is not too
heavy, whether they have not forgotten that there are sucking lambs in the flock.
Of course, the time will come when the suckling will be able to digest solid food.
Knowledge will accumulate, and by and by his education be finished. And then it would be
exceedingly foolish not to go on to perfection, but to withhold solid food, and to continue
to feed all the members of the church alike on milk. Such a course would soon empty the
church. Men provided with spiritual teeth can not live on such diet. The preaching which
is always laying the first foundations kills both preacher and people.
Hence there is a time in the life of the saint when this first process of growth is finished;
when believers, having become men, take their place among the mature and perfect. And
in this sense we hear the apostle say: “I do not belong to the babes in their mother’s lap, nor
to the children at school, but to the adults and the perfect whose education is finished. But,
473O brethren, do not think that I am perfect inwardly, for I have not yet attained; but I follow
after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus.”
We see the same difference in plant and animal, in the natural and spiritual birth. There
is first a growth to attain the full stature, then only the real development begins which in
the children of God is the unfolding of the holy disposition in their own person.
X. Perfect in Parts, Imperfect in Degrees.